Welcome to the age of Cathedrals.
My name is Professor Howard Bloch,
Sterling Professor of French at Yale University and
a Specialist in the Literature and Art History of the Middle Ages.
We shall explore together one of the great moments of turning in the West.
And we shall discover some of the most amazing architectural structures ever built,
as well as the world around them.
But let's begin by asking,
what is a Cathedral?
The word Cathedral comes from the Latin cathedra,
meaning an easy chair,
and came to mean the church or the seat of a bishop,
or the Church of a bishop seat.
As the seat of a bishop,
the cathedral functioned as the central church of a diocese,
which derives from the Greek word for administration,
and serves as the church district under the supervision of a bishop.
The diocese or bishopric may be divided into
smaller units or parishes under the care of a priest.
As the principal church of the Bishop,
the cathedral or throne came to be known for
its architectural size and its astonishing beauty.
Cathedrals first appeared in Italy,
Spain, North Africa, and what was then known as Gaul,
and now known as France in the fourth century of
the Christian era after centuries of persecution of Christians by the Romans.
But as the persecutions ended,
Christianity was declared the official religion of
the Roman Empire by the Emperor Constantine in 312 AD.
The Great Age of Cathedrals began a little later,
however in the 12th century in France.
More precisely, in the Ile-de-France,
the area in and around Paris.
From Paris, the great stone churches spread all over Europe,
where for a remarkable period of 150 years,
some 80 Gothic cathedrals were built with
many more spread over the rest of western and central Europe.
Almost all are still standing today.
Please join me in visiting some of
the most remarkable buildings the world has ever known.
As we explore the history and culture that gave rise to medieval cathedrals and we try to
understand how and why they continue to live and had meaning for our world, our own age.
